Mother of Mario Woods Administers Oath to San Francisco Public Defender Mano Raju at packed Community Inauguration

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – On
February 27, 2020, in front of a crowd of over 300 people at Brava Theater, San
Francisco Public Defender Mano Raju took his oath of office and pledged his
service to the community as part of the annual Black History Month Celebration
of the Public Defender’s Office.

His oath was
administrated by Gwen Woods, mother of Mario Woods, who was shot and killed by
police in 2015.

Before administering the
oath, Gwen Woods, surrounded by a group of mothers who have lost their children
to police violence, urged Raju to “stay hopeful” and to remember that the
people he and all public defenders serve have a story, and to “hear it.”

Woods, who is from the
Bayview in San Francisco, said that she has spent her whole life combatting
stereotypes about her community. “Hope runs out because the narrative becomes
so redundant. When you grow up in a community where black boys tell you, ‘I’m
not going to live to see 25,’ that’s a hopeless society,” said Woods. She implored Raju to, “Let them know they
count, they matter.”

Public Defender Raju’s
social justice oath emphasized his commitment to serve San Francisco’s most
vulnerable communities with an understanding of our shared humanity and pledged
to “see all the beauty, power, and potential of each person I defend.”

Raju stated in his speech
that, “This shared humanity is why we aggressively litigate our cases and
humanize our clients to judges and juries, and why long after the cases are
done, we are also fighting to connect our clients with the treatment,
employment, and housing they need to stay out of the system and be with their
loved ones and communities.” He further stated that, “Serving clients with the
utmost integrity, to me, means rejecting the stereotypes and narratives about
who our clients and their communities are, and fighting for their right to be
treated with dignity.”

The Black History Month
event, hosted by the department’s Racial Justice Committee, also featured
speeches by Supervisor Shamann Walton, Youth Commissioner Rome Jones, the
rapper Prezi, and numerous public defenders.

Supervisor Walton said, “Having
a public defender for the people is imperative. By having a community inauguration,
it definitely sheds light on the type of person he is. I am proud and excited
that Mano is carrying on the legacy of fighting for justice at the Public
Defender’s Office.” Walton noted that Raju is already working with the Board of
Supervisors on issues of police accountability.

Deputy Public Defender Niki Solis, Chair of the Racial Justice Committee, said that public defenders are “on the frontier of a civil rights battle” and are uniquely positioned to effectuate change in a system that overwhelmingly incarcerates people of color and disproportionately removes African American children from the home or places them on electronic monitoring. Solis noted, “We call out racism when we see it.”

Youth Commissioner Jones, who serves on the working group helping to rewrite the San Francisco police department’s general orders about bias in policing, noted that Black youth are underrepresented in the conversations where decisions are made, and urged his fellow youth to, “Make them put us in positions to really respect us and hear us out.”

Mano Raju’s Public Defender Oath:

I will be
compassionate, relentless, and courageous in the fight for justice.

I will be willing to see all the beauty, power, and potential of each person I represent.

I will advocate for structural changes that contribute to ending the mass incarceration system that has devastated our society for far too long.

I will fight against unjust and racist immigration laws, defend all people regardless of their birthplace or immigration status, and fight mass deportation as vigorously as I fight mass incarceration.

I will
remain committed to racial justice.

I will grow
excellence among defenders.

I will
honor the brilliance of the intergenerational resilience of our clients and
their communities.

I will remember that my representation of individuals ripples out to the folks who love them, and therefore strive to stay engaged with their families and communities.

I will keep
burning the flame of hopefulness because we know that hopelessness is the enemy
of justice.

To watch the program on Facebook live on the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office page, go here. Other performances included spoken word and music from the Fillmore-based youth organization Project Level, as well as an African drumming ceremony.

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